Georgia's PM blasts The Washington Post

11/28/12 5:17 PM EST

Georgia's new prime minister Bidzina Ivanishvili is not happy with The Washington Post.

The Post on Tuesday published an editorial, "Georgia's government takes a wrong turn," that blasted Ivanishvili for bringing "criminal charges against more than 20 senior officials of the previous administration, including the former ministers of defense and interior and the armed forces chief of staff."

"The magnate-turned-prime minister said last week that his first official visit to the United States had been postponed, which is a good thing," the Post wrote. "As long as he is imprisoning opposition leaders and seeking to monopolize power, Georgia’s new leader should not be welcome in Washington."

Foreign Policy’s Josh Rogin reported today that Ivanishvili has accused the Post of working with Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili on the editorial.

"It is amazing and I will find out how [Saakashvili] managed that such an editorial appeared [in the Washington Post]. Our president has had only one thing organized well. This is what he is currently engaged in. This is all he got. He does lobbying as much as he can. He has this system set well," he said Wednesday during a press conference in Tbilisi, according to Foreign Policy.

Ivanishvili added that his foreign minister may visit the Post to discuss the editorial while she is in D.C.

"You should know that certain incomprehensible articles were also published in Europe. Trust me, we will respond to them. In case of Washington Post, [the Foreign Minister] Maia Panjikidze is in the United States and perhaps she will contact them. We are not invited [to the United States] by Washington Post. We have never had such an agreement. It is the United States government that is inviting us," he said, according to Foreign Policy.

UPDATE (6:00 p.m.)

In an e-mail to POLITICO, Washington Post spokesperson Kris Coratti wrote that she spoke with the editorial team and was told:

We have had no recent contact with President Saakashvili and he had no involvement with our editorial. We arranged to meet with the Georgian Foreign Minister during her visit to Washington this week, at her request, before the editorial's publication.